-DATE-
19670430
-YEAR-
1967
-DOCUMENT_TYPE-
SPEECH
-AUTHOR-
F. CASTRO
-HEADLINE-
CASTRO DELIVERS SPEECH AT GUANE CEREMONY
-PLACE-
GUANE
-SOURCE-
HAVANA DOMESTIC TV
-REPORT_NBR-
FBIS
-REPORT_DATE-
19670430
-TEXT-
CASTRO DELIVERS SPEECH AT GUANE CEREMONY
Havana Domestic Television and Radio Services in Spanish 0245 GMT 30 April
1967--F/E
(Speech by Prime Minister Fidel Castro at Guane, Pinar del Rio, at a
farewell ceremony for scholarship students who worked in Guane, and to
inaugurate several new projects in the area--live)
(Text) Invited guests, comrade students, young builders, workers: Several
times during some of our many tours through these areas of Pinar del Rio
Province the girl comrades who have been working on this plan asked me to
visit them because they wanted to talk to me. We usually made fast tours
and you were divided into how many camps? (girls shout: "nine") Nine camps,
and I explained to you that it was very difficult to talk in the camps
because many of you would gather and it was impossible to walk or to talk.
If I had gone to one camp I would have had to visit all the rest. But I
always said, "I'm going to visit you anyway and we are going to have a
meeting."
Time went by. The Giron fortnight came and the end of the work schedule
approached and my promise of a meeting was still unfulfilled. But we kept
our word. This does not mean there is a lot of time, nor does it mean that
you do not deserve all the time necessary to meet and talk. You deserve, in
the opinion of all the man of the revolution, all consideration. however,
that is not the basic reason why--taking into account our promise, and even
without the promise--we believe that the organize this event to say
farewell to you tonight. We sincerely believe that the work entrusted to
you has been well done. But there is a task which no one particularly
entrusted to you and which for us has more significance and which you have
completely fulfilled. It is not a matter of the hours worked daily. It is
not the goals reached day by day for three months, which were many and
which were reached very satisfactorily. It is fundamentally the attitude
you have maintained, the willingness with which you joined in this work,
the enthusiasm you maintained all the time, the demonstration you have made
of the well-founded hopes that our revolution has in the new generation,
the way in which you have acted as representatives of our youth of today,
the spirit with which you worked which was just what we expected of you and
even more than we expected of you.
It is not a matter of making a well-deserved acknowledgement of that
attitude and that conduct. it is that in our opinion your conduct is a
symbol, a proof, an example which without a doubt will have a positive
influence on all youth and on those who came after you, and one which also
will influence you. That is why we have taken an interest in having a
documentary filed of these three months. i have asked some of you about the
documentary and some have said "yes" they were in it; others said they were
not here in this camp. Others said: "We are the vanguard and no films have
been taken of us." I do not know if it is practical or possible to take on
the task of making documentaries that can in every case satisfy those
demands. I do know that the documentary was made and it is not that the
documentary is valuable just today. It is important today and we believe
that all students should see that documentary. However, above all it will
be important in the future for you, and it will be important for the entire
country.
This revolution has been characterized not so much by the propaganda it
makes over the things it does but by the things it does. We often see many
persons filled with admiration in the presence of any work done by the
revolution, and we hear them say" "But we did not know about this," "this
is not known by many people," or "nobody knows about this." Naturally there
is nothing extraordinary about the things the revolution does. The things
that the revolution does are an elementary duty of the revolution, and from
our revolutionary point of view, the things that the revolution does will
never be enough. They will never be as many as the ambitious spirit of any
revolutionary would desire to carry out. The things that the revolution
does are the work, the reason for the revolution's existence. When there
was no revolution, anything received much publicity. If some of the history
students checked the newspapers they would see that when a classroom was
created anywhere in the country it would appear on the front page of
newspapers. When a street was repaired, when a sidewalk was repaired, when
a little park was built anyplace, when any old byway was built, when any
public work whatsoever was done, if a favor was done to anybody
anytime--since anything they did for the people or for any citizen was done
with the idea of a favor in mind--all those things were given a lot of
publicity.
There were many newspapers and they received a lot of money for giving a
lot of publicity to anything. The revolution could not begin to publish in
the newspapers all the classrooms it has built, all the things, all the
dozens upon dozens of things it has done along the length and breadth of
the nation. In the first place there would not be enough newspapers to do
so, and in the second place the revolution does not undertake public works
for the sake of propaganda. The revolution does not undertake public works
for the purpose of publicizing such works. And if the revolution does
something so that its works can be known--and it does not do much in this
regard--it does so for an utterly different reason. It does so for a useful
end. It does so because experience gained one place can serve as an example
to other places. It does it simply to inform the people. It does so to
stimulate enthusiasm in work. The revolution does not work along the
highways alone.
There were times when a few little houses were built in this country. You
can still see them in some places. They were built in along highways, and
not along any highway but along the central highway itself. The revolution
works in the mountains, in the remotest places of the nation. For example,
the revolution at this moment is working intensively near Punta de Maisi. A
plan is being carried out thee for agricultural and social development.
Many clubs were being built, many schools are being built. Some of them
will be opened, according to the promise of the construction comrades, by
July.
We meet as a matter of fact here, practically at the opposite end of the
island, near Cabo de San Antonio. I mean that the revolution's work still
has not reached Cabo de San Antonio. Even in the Guanahacabibes Peninsula
there are hundreds of families who have to travel on really infernal
byways. But I think there is no doubt that we will also reach Cabo de San
Antonio and that the revolutions work will also benefit these families.
We are working in the Escambry mountains. We are working intensively in the
Oriente mountains, both in the Sierra Maestra and in the second front. We
are working the Pinar del Rio mountains. In other words--and I enumerate
these things so that you can see how the revolution presses its work ahead
without too much concern, not even too much, even a little, about making
any propaganda about the work--and this is why, quite reasonably, many say
when they see many of the things that are being done, that they are
surprised, amazed, and cannot explain why these things are not known. Well,
we cannot exactly explain it ourselves. We think part of the reason is that
little comes out about it, and part of the reason is that many do not
bother to read much. We are all to blame for this. We ought to know the
things that are done. But some work in their front--the press, let us
say--and they publish some of the things. Not for propaganda's sake but so
that the people will know about them, because we understand that this can
become part of their enthusiasm. it can become an encouragement for
everything, although, really, in view of the people's attitude, one could
say that not much encouragement is needed because there is a surefelt of
encouragement and enthusiasm.
It happens that we have much to learn about everything. And also in this
matter of having means, of using the numerous publicity media
available--radio, television, movies, the press, magazines--apparently we
do not know how to use them for greatest effectiveness, just as we did not
know how to use practically anything most effectively. Fortunately,
however, we have been learning in the past few years, and as a result we
are learning to do things better. We hope that in this matter of informing
the people we will also learn and make headway.
How many things. If we talk about any of these topics regarding
deficiencies, I recall something we ascertained in the Oriente mountains
not long ago. It was the fact that in spite of the many printing presses we
had in the nation, in spite of the many workers in the printing shops, in
spite of all the paper that had been used, not a single book for peasants
had been published. A peasant would go to a mountain store and he would
find books on philosophy. This does not mean philosophy is something to be
disdained, but those peasants were in no position to be studying questions
of deep philosophy. They were interested in books of agriculture, books on
mechanization, books on many things. I asked a worker in a store one day
about the books he had there and the books he sold. He said" "Well we have
many books by Marx and Engles." Marx and Engles? (laughter) And there were
books on political philosophy, all kinds of books. One asks, "what are
these books doing here?" And it is that no books for peasants were
published in this country. Well, they were not even published in this
country. Well they were not even published for students. Fortunately that
is a chapter of the past, and for some time all the necessary books have
been published for students, and a book institute has been organized that
is publishing many books, making maximum use of our abundant human
resources in the publishing field and of the machinery that the country
has. Possibly we will learn to use paper to better advantage.
Sometimes millions of copies of certain works were printed which were
alter, as Marx said, submitted to the destructive criticism of moths and
mice. They were stored and were not even distributed. We should not be
surprised that some of the things our people do today are now known if many
of the very important things that humanity has done were not known before,
if not even basic information on agricultural technology was disseminated
among our agricultural workers and peasants, if technical information was
not disseminated among our students, if our students did not have
textbooks.
It is clear that this problem was not easy to solve, and it was necessary
to adopt a decision that we believed revolutionary. There is in the world
what is called "intellectual property." In these things of property we have
less and less experience. Before, everything was property, property, and
property. There was no better-known concept, nor a more widespread concept,
nor a more sacred concept than that of private property. Everything was
private. Possibly that ground on which you are sitting at this movement was
very private. Houses, land, the mountains, the sky, the sea, everything was
private because at least on the sea, or the seas that surrounded Cuba, some
boat sailing on those waters was a private boat.
Well and good,those things are being left behind. All of our new generation
is familiarizing itself more and more with different concepts of property
and begins to see all those things as things of common usage and as things
that belong to all of society. It is clear that it could be said that air
was not private only because it was not possible to take all the air and
put it in a jug. If this had been practical and possible in the same way
that the land hogs took over the land, they would have taken over the air.
However, it would have been better if they had taken over the air and not
the food. Air was practically within the reach of everybody because it
could not be sealed up in a bottle. But food was not within everybody's
reach, because the land on which it was produced was not within the reach
of the people.
Among all the things that became property there was one that became so in
particular: intellectual property. You may say: "But that is abstract
property." Yes, it is abstract property. The strange thing is that air
could not be shut up in a bottle, but something as abstract as intellectual
property could be shut up. What is this about intellectual property? It is
something more than well known. Just in case there is someone who is not
too familiar with it, intellectual property is simply that property which
emanates from--is a product of--the intelligence of an individual, of a
group of individuals, a book for example, any technical book, a novel. I
want to make it clear, because I do not wish to be hated by the
intellectuals, first of all because it would be an unjustified hate. This
does not mean in the lest a lack of knowledge of the worth,the value,and
even the right to live, of the one who produces that type of spiritual
goods. Very well. But what happens? That right of property of intellectual
goods, because of custom, because of the system in the world in which we
live in a relatively recent era, because of the influence of all that
capitalist concept of society, those intellectual goods were the object of
buying and selling.
Intellectual creators generally have been poorly paid and many have
suffered hunger. Anyone who reads the biography of Balzac, for example, one
off the great novelists of the last century, is moved to see the poverty in
which that good man lived. In general, many great creators suffered much
hunger because they had no help. Many intellectual works have had great
value, but long after their authors dies. There were famous people in all
fields of art, men who in their time were absolutely intellectual creators
suffered much hunger because they had no help. Many intellectual works have
had great value, but long after their authors dies. There were famous
people in all fields of art, men who in their time were absolutely
intellectual creators have lived in poverty, have lacked the support of
society, and many times have had to sell their intellectual productions at
any price.
In what circumstances or situation do we find ourselves? An underdeveloped
country, a country that absolutely lacked technical knowledge, a country
that had to begin by assuming the task of teaching 1 million citizens to
read and write, a country that had to begin to read and write, a country
that had to begin to create technical schools and institutes, schools of
all types, from primary schools to universities, a nation that had to begin
on the road to the training of hundreds of thousands of qualified workers
and technicians to emerge from misery, to emerge from underdevelopment, a
nation that had to recoup the centuries of backwardness that weighed us
down, a nation that when it proposed to recoup all this lost time, when it
proposed to create living conditions for the people, when it proposed to
overcome misery, underdevelopment--a nation that then had to invest each
centavo, many times, a large part of the scarce resources available to it
in construction, in obtaining means of production, factories, equipment,
that had to make innumerable investments, and found itself facing the fact
that it could not educate the people. Why? Because to the extent that our
citizens learned to read and write, to the extent that all the children
began to go to school, to the extent that the number of sixth grade
graduates passed 50,000 and reached 60,000, 70,000, 80,000, to the extent
that greater numbers enrolled in the technological institutes and in the
university, to the extent that we strived to surmount underdevelopment and
ignorance, the number of textbooks we needed became increasingly greater.
And the books were and are very expensive. In view of all these ideas on
intellectual property we saw the need, if we wanted to satisfy the demand
for textbooks, to spend tens of millions of pesos in books, paying their
price in many cases. Yet is its difficult to establish in practice that
which is called intellectual property. it was not the intellectual property
of the authors or the spiritual product but of those who on the market paid
with money on the barrel and at any price. Those who had the book monopoly
generally paid low prices for that product of intelligence. They had the
right to sell the books at the price they considered proper. A decision had
to be made, yes, a defiant decision but a just decision. And our country,
de facto, adopted the decision to also abolish intellectual property.
(applause)
What does this mean? We think that technical knowledge should be the
patrimony of all mankind. We feel that what man's intelligence has created
should be the patrimony of all mankind. Who pays Cervantes his royalties
for intellectual property? Who pays Shakespeare? Who pays the ones who
invented the alphabet, those who invented numerals arithmetic, mathematics?
All mankind has benefited in one way or another. All mankind in one way or
another uses the creations of man's intelligence throughout history. From
the first primitive man who took a stick in his hand to knock down a fruit,
mankind began to benefit from a creation of intelligence. From the first
man who emitted a growl, a growl that was meant to say something, the dawn
of a future language, mankind began to use this product of man's
intelligence.
In other words, all or rather the large majority of man's creations have
been accumulating through thousands of years and all mankind feels it is
entitled to the enjoyment of the creation of intelligence. Everybody feels
he has the right to enjoy all the creations of past generations. How is it
possible to want to deny man today, hundreds of thousands of human beings,
not hundreds of thousands, I am wrong, hundreds of millions, billions of
human beings who now live in poverty, in underdevelopment--how is it
possible to want to block the access to technology for billions of human
beings, a technology that they need for such basic things as nourishment,
such as life itself.
Logically, a decision of this kind generally draws enmity, brings about
injured interests. Often when intellectual property is annulled, it is done
clandestinely, surreptitiously; it is not announced. We are not going to
adopt this procedure. We proclaim that we consider all technical knowledge
a patrimony right of all mankind and that the peoples who have been most
exploited have a particular right to it because, where is there hunger,
where is there underdevelopment? (applause) where is there ignorance? Where
is the lack of technical knowledge? There, in all those regions of the
world where men re criminally exploited by colonialism and by imperialism
for centuries. In general, technical books are produced in developed
countries. The poor countries, the countries exploited for centuries, do
not have the right to use that technology even though for centuries many of
the resources with which those countries with modern technology developed
came out of their own hides? In the United States there are thousands and
thousands of technical books. Well, we have begun by abolishing the
intellectual property of all technical books of the United States.
(applause) We proclaim our right to print all the North American technical
books that we believe are of some use to us. (applause)
Obviously, to justify this we do not lack any of the grounds expounded
previously. When we print technical books of the United States we do it
with all the right of recompensing ourselves in some measure for the damage
they have tried to do this country. Well and good, there would be more than
enough justified reasons with respect to the United States. But we, in
addition to these circumstances, believe it a right of our people and all
underdeveloped countries to use all the technical knowledge published in
the world. Consequently we believe ourselves in the right to print any book
of a technical nature that we may need for our development, that we may
need to train or technicians. What do we give in exchange for this? We
believe it a duty of society to help and encourage, we believe it a duty of
society to protect all intellectual creators--not protect--perhaps that is
not the proper concept. We believe they should take their place in society
with all the rights as eminent workers. Our society can, and is prepared
to, compensate all Cuban intellectual creators, but at the same time we
must renounce, renounce internationally, any right of property that may
accrue to us. (applause)
Not many technical books are produced in this country, but much music
pleasing to the world has been produced. In the future our people will
produce more and more in all intellectual fields. As of now, we say that we
renounce all rights to our intellectual property and that (?since) things
are settled between the Cuban intellectual producer and the Cuban
Government, our country renounces all rights to intellectual property. This
means our books may be freely printed anywhere in the world, (applause)
while we at the same time consider ourselves to have the right to do the
same. If all countries were to do the same thing, humanity would benefit.
However, this means all of them. It is impossible to think that a
capitalist country can do this, but if all the countries were to do exactly
the same, for each book that a country would produce, a book that a country
printed, better said, a book that was written,and rights over this book
were renounced,the country could acquire the rights to the books written in
all the other countries of the world. Naturally, we cannot attempt to make
it thus, but on our part decided that this will be our policy on this
problem of intellectual property. We believe it is proper that we declare
it with all frankness regardless of what may be said.
Naturally we can make some arrangements of mutual benefit with any country
which prints books of which it has large numbers,and we can send books
which we print in large numbers. Any type of exchange of books already
printed, any exchange of this type, we can carry out perfectly, anything
that is agreeable with any country, but this is the policy to which we will
adhere. We will do the same thing with things called patents. It is true
that we have not yet invented great things, nor many things. It is not that
we are not thinking of becoming inventors, but any small thing that we
invent will be at the service of all humanity, any success in the field of
technology, any success in the field of agriculture, and we must say that
we aspire to many successes in that field.
Not much time will pass until many people in many places will have to turn
their eyes to see what we are doing here and how this country, in a
tropical area, resolves many of the agricultural problems not resolved in
other tropical countries of the world. Poverty has mainly been a feature of
tropical countries. There are practically no tropical countries in the
so-called developed regions of the world. Without any doubt whatsoever, we
shall place ourselves in the forefront in agriculture in the tropical areas
of the world. our solutions and our technology will be available to anyone
desiring to take advantage of them. It is known, for example, that our
sugarcane research institute is conducting several investigations. It is
working on new and better sugarcane strains. Well, whenever we, a
cane-producing country interested in the particular strain. (applause) We
are not going to display any foolish or niggardly egotism. No. We shall not
get worried about competition. If, for example, in the field of agriculture
we develop a poultry strain that lays more eggs than another, or produces
more meat than another, we will make it available to any country in the
world.
If, in the field of livestock breeding, where we are doing massive work in
genetics, we manage to produce optimum breeds or new species, or if we
manage to produce within the existing breeds a specimen having special
characteristics, we shall make our knowledge available to those needing it.
They will also be able to acquire such specimens by means of artificial
insemination or any other procedure. We shall do this in every aspect of
agriculture. We shall not worry about competition, for competition belongs
to a world of starvation. It belongs to an underdeveloped world.
Competition belongs to a world in which hunger and poverty have become an
institution. What is competition? It is a contest between producers of the
same product for a limited market. Where there is competition there is a
contest. It is not a contest to supply everyone with his needs but rather
to supply food to him who can pay for it. That is the way it was in our
country. Any commodity could be in surplus, because production was not
meant to satisfy needs but rather the market. He who did not have a penny
in his pocket had no value. There could be a surplus of coffee, milk, meat,
citrus fruit, and everything else, because a man lacked the money to buy
them.
Amid the unemployment, the chaos, the anarchy, and the limitations of a
capitalist economy,there could be a surplus of any commodity,because there
exited a larger surplus of unemployment than of things. There was a surplus
of people who did not have a cent in their pockets on any way of getting
it; so they had no value.
Hundreds of millions of people are living in poverty in this world. They
are undernourished. These concepts of competition will have to disappear in
the world of tomorrow, because just as our people today are producing not
for the market but for their own needs--that is, they are trying to produce
enough to meet their domestic needs rather than for the market--so in the
world of tomorrow the nations will have to work with the same idea.
Naturally, this will only happen when colonialism and imperialism have
disappeared from the world. We know that the world has its needs and that
there will always be someone who needs what we produce and who can produce
articles that we need. Hence, it is to our advantage to put our agriculture
into full production. We devote ourselves to the mass implementation or our
technology and to the gigantic development of our plans in all sectors of
production in order to produce enough to meet all our own needs and to
produce more than what is necessary so as to exchange our products. We know
that everything we produce will always be of use to someone else and that
other countries will be able to do the same and produce those articles
which are of use to us.
However, beginning with our domestic market, we shall produce enough to
meet all our needs. We shall produce as much mil as we need, and when we
have a mil surplus we shall not throw it out. What have many capitalist
countries done during past decades? When there was a coffee surplus, they
burned the coffee. When there was a surplus of another product, they burned
it or threw it out. Then there were the restrictions. We shall not be
burdened by those ills. If we have a milk surplus some day, we will
determine the average consumption and we will either lower the price of
milk or give it away. Several weeks ago we began to have a surplus of some
of our agricultural products. What happened? Some small markets were set up
where a few things were bought. The excess was given away to the shoppers.
For example, this year 4 million citrus plants are being fertilizes. You
know what a citrus plant is. You also know how much 1 million citrus plants
are. We estimate that there are 4 million citrus trees throughout the
country. At present all the trees are being fertilized. The citrus crop was
abundant this year. It is possible that next year, during certain
months--that is, unless there is one of those troublesome hurricanes which
we get from time to time and which still cause damage because production is
not properly distributed in all regions--thee may be months when there is a
surplus of citrus fruit.
Of course, there is a foreign market for citrus fruit,and we are preparing
for export and are establishing pertinent industries. Long before we will
have established the proper export conditions, we will be producing large
quantities of citrus fruit here. The citrus fruit we are fertilizing is not
mainly intended for export but rather for domestic consumption. All the
citrus fruit you see being planted here and in many other parts of the
country is intended for export. Speaking of citrus fruit, I can tell you
for example that in 1967, 1968, and in part of 1969, we will plant do you
know how many hectares of citrus fruit? We will plant 100,000 hectares,
more or less--with irrigation. We have already decided where the planting
will be done. Much of that land used to be like this--underutilized and
covered with brush.
We thus have immense and magnificent prospects, not only for our sugar crop
but also for the citrus crop, which will also be an extraordinary and
magnificent advantage to our people. Then we shall have enough citrus fruit
for everyone to eat his fill. With every citizen eating as much fruit as he
wants every day, there will still be a surplus of 8 out of every 10 trees
for export. And we do not only intend to plant those hectares of citrus
trees--they are being planted by all the technical methods and they will
have maximum productivity. We hope to compete with the most advanced
contrives of the world in the per hectare productivity of citrus fruit. To
get an idea of what 100,000 hectares of citrus trees will mean, suffice it
to say that our annual citrus production will almost amount to as much as
the United States produces for a population of 200 million (applause)--a
varied production of various kinds, with irrigation, with the maximum
productivity from the maximum number of trees per unit of land, and with
the maximum of protection against hurricanes. Not only that,but all the
necessary measures will be taken to obtain plants immune to the blights
most likely to strike citrus plantations.
We are already selecting many seeds belonging to strains that are immune to
some of these blights. For those cases where we had to plant--at a time
when the few such immune trees had not yet been located and when we were
forced to plant certain nonimmune trees as stock--we are not making the
first immune grafts. They will come out of the main trunk and will
guarantee against certain kinds of epidemics along wit the already immune
roots. These are some aspects of the technology of citrus fruit growing.
But I should like to explain that they will be strains immune to the
diseases likely to be most dangerous to the citrus production. Our plants
will be irrigated. They will be protected against hurricanes. They will be
protected against disease. They will be given the best attention and the
proper fertilizer formulas. The soil and the leaves of the trees will be
examined constantly. After the plantations, there will be the
laboratories--the technicians in the examination of leaves--wherever there
are large citrus plantations.
As a result of the development of our agricultural technology, new things
have made their appearance, very new and very interesting. In general it
was customary to plant bananas, malanga, and root crops between the citrus
trees--that is, to work the land. This breaking of the ground in citrus
groves is very harmful. It is not the correct thing. In many countries they
advise keeping a ground cover of pasturage or grass that does not grow very
much. We are going to introduce an innovation. In that space we are going
to plant, not an annual crop, but we are going to take advantage of the
space between the rows of citrus trees and between one tree and the next to
plant a smaller plant that can perfectly well occupy that space. Between
the citrus trees we are going to plant coffee. (applause)
We have been planting coffee in the mountains, on rolling ground. Coffee
plantations have been established, are being established, and will continue
to be established. But now this magnificent variant has made its
appearance. In the space between rows--coffee! Hence we will also have
tends of thousands of hectares of coffee benefiting from irrigation among
the citrus trees, coffee of a variety that is fairly resistant to the sun,
as we are absolutely certain that it will grow wonderfully in these
irrigated citrus plantations.
And so we have a nursery with 24 million coffee plants where many of you
have perhaps worked. (applause) This year will see a start on planting
them. Hence, if the citrus trees begin producing fruit in four years, the
coffee will begin bearing in two. when the citrus trees grow and develop,
the leaf area of the coffee will naturally be reduced, but for many years
we will utilize this land, and even when the citrus trees are big--since by
pruning we can allow branches a little higher on some and little lower on
others--we will have each of those hectares covered with citrus trees
higher up and covered lower down with the foliage of the coffee plants,
which, as you know, can resist sunshine but can also produce in the shade
of fruit trees.
Therefore, in addition to the coffee plantations that are being
established, there arises this new possibility of increasing the growing of
coffee, which is another thing we can produce for our needs and also as
another of our country's exportable surpluses. Our agriculture, then, is
developing. Every kind of innovation is introduces. As you have seen here,
our agriculture is already making mass use of planes. Near this Guane
program is the school where our air force pilots are trained. (applause)
These comrades learned to handle the planes before these programs because
they had to drop (?and to provide phosphates). Now, and in exercises, they
use those planes and (?that time) in spreading lime for example, which has
produced excellent results in the pastures of this area. They use them in
spreading fertilizer. The use of planes for spreading fertilizer opens a
field of incredible possibilities. These citrus groves with coffee
underneath have one disadvantage, some will say. What disadvantage? If you
plant little coffee plants between the rows, how can you run machinery in
the citrus groves? But we can answer: we will not need that machinery in
the citrus groves, not even to get rid of the weeds. We can get rid of the
weeds with weedkiller, using portable rigs, but we can even use planes
spraying weedkiller so as not to have to use machines. But we will do still
better. We will eradicate weeds from these groves. We will eliminate weeds
in this area, and it will not be necessary to fight weeds then. (applause)
All of you know how a citrus or mango tree is fertilized, for you have
engaged in all those activities. The fertilizer is carried, it is placed
around the (word indistinct). But when all these fields are in citrus trees
and coffee, we can use planes to apply the proper formula of fertilizer to
all these caballerias, and thousands of caballerias can be fertilized by a
few pilots using a few planes. That really is productivity, productivity
that can be achieved only in big groves. It is almost impossible to attain
this in small plantings, where everything is mixed. Someone might wonder:
what is this about spraying a fertilizer formula on land where different
formulas? How can it be applied on the same ground, if different formulas
are required? Citrus trees and coffee bushes do require different formulas,
but not entirely different. As far as nitrogen goes, the formulas are
generally the same for coffee and citrus, and in general the same in
phosphorus requirements. They may be more or less the same in magnesium.
They are different, for example, in students. (applause) Many will perhaps
work in the fertilizer plant. It will be a very simple matter, if, for
example,the citrus formula requires 12 percent potassium and the coffee
formula 18, to apply to formula like 14-8-12 to both, and later, with
portable equipments to apply potassium to the coffee plants' foliage to
make up the difference between the two formulas. Hence, the fact that two
types of plants are together will not keep us from using planes.
We will not have to use machines. Our principal work will be pruning--it is
not hard--(?painting) the little plants--you know that is not a very hard
job--and the harvesting. Somebody may ask: Are you not planning to
mechanize the harvesting? And then we would say in astonishment: But what
do you want? Do you want us to spend the whole day sitting down? If we
mechanize the harvesting, then what in the world are we going to do? What
in the world will our hundreds of thousands, our millions of young people
do, people whom we must provide with something to do? (applause) If the
picking, too, could be done by plane it would be a headache. But why should
we worry about the harvesting problem? Have we not seen an example of what
our students have done this year and what just a few students have done in
this area? Here, anybody would say there had been 10,000, and there were
only 2,000. And 2,000 have accomplished enough to make millions of people
happy for a long time. (applause) You have worked three months and have
practically left enough little plants to provide seven citrus trees for
every person in the country. (applause) When every individual eats all the
citrus fruit he wants, two would be enough for him. If there were no more
citrus trees in the country, and none were planted other than the little
ones you have left in the nurseries and (word indistinct) and seed beds,
there would be enough to allot every citizen of this country two plants and
still export five for every citizen.
And there are only 2,000 of you. And that is not all you have done. You
have picked light tobacco so that millions of people can smoke. (applause)
And we estimate that in 1970 we will have half 1 million students at the
middle and higher levels, from lower secondary to the university--half a
million in 1970; and in 1975 at least 1 million. On the day we have 1
million, organized in some way, they will be able to gather any harvest. If
we were to plant only citrus fruit and coffee plants in the entire country,
1 million youths would be required to harvest all of it. Unfortunately, we
cannot do so because we have to plant pine saplings and they take 12 years
to mature. We have to plant them. We have to give them a little fertilizer
at the beginning and then continue fertilizing them with planes. I would
like to tell you, however, that we are testing the planting of some
varieties of coffee plants among the pines, because we know that among
those poor pine trees--among those poor pines--grows a weed that burns like
gunpowder, and every now and then there is a fire.
We are relying on the plans of the forestry people, and these plans are
big, very big, indeed. They are already laying out the cross paths--to help
prevent the spread of fires--and the roads. They are getting equipment to
put out fires and are even working on plans to use planes to put out fires,
at least, if not planes, then helicopters. The plane, if used well, is
man's great friend and an extraordinary friend of agriculture. However,
when the planes are used as the criminal imperialists are using them in
Vietnam, then they are man's great enemy. Well, then, it is evident that we
will have to add to this soil a little (?calcium), a little organic matter,
but we are so optimistic about it that we think--according to the tests
were are making in an area where pine saplings are going to be planted--a
variety of coffee that is very resistant to drought will prosper in the
mountains of Oriente. If instead of tinder-like weeds, we have so much
coffee that we will not bother to pick the coffee beans growing there. At
least the coffee plants will keep the pine trees green and cool and protect
them from fires.
The coffee plant is so pretty that, in short, it can be used as an
ornamental plant. We are going to plant the coffee bush in parks on
sidewalks, everywhere, without, of course, ruining the gardens. We are just
going to add another small ornamental plant. Every garden has 6, 7, 8, 10,
11, 20 varieties of plants. Why cannot we allow the little poor coffee bush
a bit of space in the gardens since it produces such a pleasant and pretty
flower?
Therefore, the possibilities are greater and greater and daily grow
greater. One may well ask: Where does the road of technology, the road of
innovations end? The reply is that it really never ends. In every phase of
agriculture in which we are working, we discover daily new
possibilities--possibilities that we did not suspect yesterday but that are
realities today and possibility realities tomorrow, new realities that
perhaps we do not even suspect today. This is because every day we discover
more--some new way of combining plants, animals, and crops so as to achieve
the greatest benefit for mankind from agriculture. We are not working
intensively with only citrus fruit, coffee plants, and livestock; we are
also working intensively--as you know--with sugarcane. Next year we shall
see how much sugarcane we have. The only thing we can say is that today we
are cultivating sugarcane as never before. Every caballeria of land on
which sugarcane is grown is being fertilized. Not a single inch of
sugarcane is will remain unfertilized. We mean both the quality and
quantity of fertilizer we use. The total amount of fertilizer to be used on
the sugarcane fields will be half a million tons.
I was telling you that we are working on this and also on reforestation. We
intend to reforest every corner of the country where lumber-producing trees
can be planted. We should never have deforested the mountain sides.
Mountains with very steep slopes, where agriculture is practically
impossible, were stripped of trees by heartless exploiters and landholders
and converted into grazing areas. However, grazing grass was either planted
in the areas, or they were abandoned and turned into thickets. They took
away from nature and gave it nothing in return. It took dozens of years,
centuries at times, for nature to produce many trees. Then came those who
seized the land, stripped it of trees, and made a big business out of it
without replanting a single tree for those of us who came later, for this
people that was growing in number, for this people that totaled hardly 2
million when the land was covered with woods. Then the land was covered
with sugarcane at first. Some U.S. companies used our best and most
valuable lumber--lumber that had been famous in the entire world for
several centuries--as kindling wood in their sugar centrals. The forests
disappeared from the plains and mountains,and the population hardly reached
2 million souls when more than half of the country was covered with
forests. Today this population has grown to almost 8 million, and what
lumber does it have to build its homes and its furniture? They left this
country so desolate and stripped that sometimes it is hard to bury a person
because no lumber can be found. This is the reason we see so very many
huts, tens of thousands of huts.
Logically enough, we are not going to solve the problem of the huts with
lumber but rather with cement. For this reason, two large cement plants
will be completed next year. Other cement plants will be enlarged, and
still others acquired. But in the construction of homes and in the making
of furniture.
We have not even had enough lumber for construction, and everything
requires lumber: railroad tracks require lumber; electric and telephone
wires require lumber; pasture grounds require it; agriculture in general
requires it. (few words indistinct) we were left with such scarcity of
lumber; they left the country stripped. The revolution has planted more
than 300 million trees. However, this is little. Between now and 1970, we
must have at least 1 billion trees. It will not be as at first, when we
planted a tree without making a good study of the land. Did we plant
eucalyptus or pine trees? No. We are going to plant the trees that are most
suitable to our needs in every part of the country, taking into
consideration the characteristics of the land. In areas best suited for
pine trees, we shall plant pine trees. The same will apply to trees
yielding valuable lumber. In this category of valuable lumber, we shall
grow the three in which we are most interested and that can best adopt
itself to the conditions prevailing in this or that area.
For this reason, even now the geography school of Havana University is
located in the Sierra Maestra. Students are taking courses there and
studying there. They are analyzing and investigating every corner of the
Sierra Maestra, according to the number of trees remaining. In places where
there are no more trees, or where someone has planted some kind of tree, or
where trees neither remain nor have been planted, the oldest residents of
the place are asked to explain what type or types of trees used to grow
there best so that the reforestation plans may be adapted to the natural
conditions prevailing ]in the area. Not only this, but we shall begin
genetic work with the trees. We are going to choose those trees that can
best be used to furnish seeds for reforestation. Certain characteristics in
trees, as in animals, are inherited. If necessary, we will practice
forestry genetics. We already have the cooperation of technicians (?and)
Havana University professors. They are working on the selection of the
trees to be used for the production of seeds.
Reforestation is also a field of extraordinary possibilities for our
country, of extraordinary importance. It promises extraordinary fruits for
the economy and the well-being of our nation, and every attention must be
devoted to it so that the natural environment will not be destroyed. It is
a crime, while passing through any of these regions, to see mountains that
are almost completely eroded, where the original bedrock is bare.
Therefore, if we do not conserve these natural resources, the day may come
when only rock will remain in many places, with that organic covering,
formed over hundreds of thousand of years, having been destroyed in a few
years by the deforestation of the mountains, by the improper cultivation of
the mountains. In other countries with small area, the peoples have been
forced to farm the mountains. Our peasants went to the mountains, thrown
out of the lowlands by the poverty, latifundists, and hunger. That does not
mean the mountains may not be utilized for agriculture. Trees can be
planted, as well as some crops such as coffee. One can help protect the
mountains. That crime against nature was committed in this country, the
crime of removing the trees from our mountains. The result was erosion,
climatic changes, reduction of rainfall, greater droughts, worse conditions
for agriculture in the lowlands, more than 1,000 casualties when the
hurricanes come, because the water, not retained in the mountains, quickly
flows through the watershed and creates enormous floods. Another result
which can be cited is that the dams being built are quickly filled with
soil. All these are the consequences of the absurd act of farming the
mountains.
Many of our peasants still farm the mountains. This, naturally, cannot be
changed overnight. However, we are thinking about a campaign among the
peasants to get them to cultivate lumber-producing trees and coffee, to get
them to reduce the crops for their personal consumption to the minimum and
not to farm for commercial products in the mountains, such as planting
viands or grains in the mountains for sale. They can plant coffee, which
can bring them a more than satisfactory income, an income that is even
greater than other types of commercial crops. They can plant
lumber-producing trees, which constitute a resource. The revolution
proposes to give them every assistance. We have the seedlings for that type
of planting. Let no other type of planting be done in the mountains. In
view of the experience we have gained about peasant reaction to any
plan--such as the one about fertilizing the coffee, which has resulted in
the fact that all peasants are fertilizing coffee plantations today--we are
certain we will get maximum cooperation from the peasants living in the
mountains for conservation of our natural resources. It is our duty to
protect nature. This land belongs to us, but not just to us; it also
belongs to the future generations. We do not have the right to leave to
future generations, which will number more than we are, which will require
much more from the soil than we do, a situation of impoverished and
destroyed nature.
We would ask the peasants: What are the generations going to live on? You
are the parents, you have here 10, 12 children. The population multiplies.
On what are the future generations going to live if we leave them destroyed
lands? Naturally, it is necessary to create that state of mind, to teach
and train technicians, to teach how contour farming is done, to give the
land the best use to conserve it. For example, now, while the planting is
underway, you can see the erosion being done by the wind, not the water.
While the soil is uncovered (Castro changes thought -ed.)--Right here,
there was an example of a type of erosion, which covered you with dust a
few minutes ago. Air also removes the organic cover.
Soil must be protected from water and air. We are optimistic about that,
because soil can be not only protected, but considerably improved. It is
not only possible to conserve nature; nature can be improved. With the use
of fertilizers, soils can be enriched, the organic cover can be enriched.
By the construction of hydraulic works, vegetation soil can be improved,
and millions of tons of water that would otherwise flow to the sea would
remain in the soil. Combining with fertilizers and with air, this water
turns into organic covering, the fertility, and the productivity of the
soil. In this way, we can improve and conserve our natural conditions.
Our agriculture is already reaching such technical levels that we will even
fertilize the tree plantations. We will not have to wait tens of years--in
8, 10, 12, 15 years, with fertilization, we will be able to obtain
magnificent lumber from most of the types of trees in our country. We will
accelerate the growth of the trees, and we will fertilize tens of millions
of trees this year. For next year we are planning to fertilize all the new
lumber-producing trees we have planted. That is to say, beginning in 1968
we will annually fertilize all the forest plantings we have made. We expect
that by 1975 we will be able to cut many of the trees we planted some yeas
ago. I do not speak of the eucalyptus tree, which is already being used,
and other trees, but rather the pine tree or the fine lumber or the
hardwood trees, which have a longer growing period.
By agriculture technology we expect to considerably reduce the growing
period, and there will no longer be any reason for the planter of a tree to
feel that he will die before the tree bears fruit. Already, even the aged
in our country will be able to plant trees with the certainty that they
will see the fruits of that tree. (applause)
I have dwelt on these considerations, thinking it would help you have a
broader view of what is being done, that it would help you place this plan
among the plans being carried out throughout the country. Some listeners
here who naturally have not had the chance to visit Guane may be interested
in knowing, more or less, what this plan involves, and I am going to give,
briefly, some information on what we plant to plant in this area of Guane
and the immediate area of Pinar del Rio. There is an extensive band of soil
very similar to this one. It was considered poor land in the past. No
latifundist would have paid much for these land, but that is because the
soils have different characteristics. Any latifundist would have preferred
the black soil from Bayamo, and would have paid three times the price. But
for certain crops, such as citrus fruit, this soil is much better than the
Bayamo soil. These are sandy, loose, deep soils, and the citrus fruit is a
crop that produces among the highest economic returns per hectare. It is
hardly likely that other crops can compete with citrus fruit, not even
coffee, which can produce quite a bit with good technology, but which
cannot be compared with citrus fruit. That is why we will have coffee among
the citrus corps, as a subproduct of the citrus plantations.
In this Guane region, according to the plans--although, naturally, we must
still make some studies of some uncertain areas, analyze certain soils,
make measurements--it is estimated, according to the general plan, that we
will plant 1,600 caballerias of oranges, 100 of grapefruit, 500 of
tangerines, 100 of French lemons, 50 of Parsian lemons, 100 of limes, 300
of local lemons, 220 of mangos, 50 of annona apples; 50 of guanabano trees,
50 of guava trees, 50 of alligator pears, 20 of (name indistinct) trees,
600 of coconuts and 100 of papayas. The papaya plant is of another type; it
cannot be considered a fruit tree, although, like the banana tree, it
produces fruit.
Moreover, another 1,000 caballerias of oranges will be planted in the
adjacent area, 200 of grapefruit, 200 of tangerines, 50 more of French
lemons, 50 of Persian lemons, 50 of limes, and 100 of (word indistinct).
This is the general plan, and all the seedbeds have already been prepared.
Of course, it might be modified in details, according to the most precise
studies of each tract of land. However, in general terms, this is the
general outline of the plan. This does not include an additional area of
lemons, which will be planted in unirrigated areas. This does not include
the plantations we are planning with the small farms. In addition to the
state plan, we are going to give technical and mechanical assistance to the
small farmers for their crops. We are going to give them seedbeds,
seedlings, and resources for the various crops, such as tobacco, so that
they will get higher production, irrigate what they can, plant citrus fruit
in those areas which are good, for example, for lemons. That is to say
that, apart from this plan in the state lands,there will be the plan to be
carried out with the small farmers. Moreover, as I already explained,
coffee will be planted among the fruit plantations. Up to 250 caballerias
of light tobacco will be planted. This year you harvested some only: so
long. (laughter)
(unintelligible voice addresses Castro--ed.) well, it (not explained--ed.)
gave good results and it was also harvested. In the past it was not
harvested, the result of the custom of underestimating it. But it does have
economic value. So, naturally, those caballerias will be plowed for some
legume in order to feed the cattle. There will also be some hundreds of
caballerias of sweet potatoes and corn rotating with the sweet potatoes;
and in addition, 2,700 caballerias of pasture. In those pastures we will
use grasses and legumes which have been proved in the production of high
yields of milk and meat. A genetics project is underway, and we hope to
use, at the same time, the byproducts of the citrus plantations--all those
citrus fruits which are canned and which can produce juice, essential oils
that are growing in demand throughout the world. The bagasse will be used
for the feeding of cattle, because it contains large amounts of certain
elements for the production of milk and meat. That is to say, we will
produce citrus fruit from the (state plan--ed.) area, as well as milk, by
virtue of the byproducts.
On these 2,700 caballerias of pasture, milking some 70,000 or 75,000 cows,
we hope for a production of 1 million quarts of milk daily in the Guane
regional one. This, of course, is not the only plan. (applause) Like citrus
fruit, coffee, and everything else, milk will also be in surplus supply in
this country. thanks to the application of technology to insemination,
there are already 2,000 insemination technicians working,and there are more
than 1 million cows in the insemination plan. By the end of the year there
will be 3,000 insemination technicians and approximately 2 million cows.
This plan has grown enormously in recent years. We went from 50,000 to 1
million cows in 18 months, as soon as masses of insemination technicians
graduated and the conditions were created. The results are incredible, as
is the amount of milk produced by the first cows resulting from crossing
the Kolstein and Zebu through insemination. The figure is impressive. Of
course, I do not want to extend myself in treating that matter here.
Suffice it to say that at the end of the year there will be some 2 million
cows. Already, the ones being born this designated F-1, the result of the
first cross; instead of saying the son, grandson, or great-grandson, we say
F-1, F-2, or F-3, which is the terminology used by geneticists--all the
F-1s which are born this year, including all the Zebu cows inseminated up
to June, will have their daughters in production in 1970. The great leap in
milk production should take place in 1970, when hundreds of thousands of
F-1s of that type suddenly go into production.
You will understand this perfectly well if I tell you that in 1971 and 1972
the increase of production of citrus fruit and coffee will be huge when
these immense plans are implemented. The same thing will happen in the
livestock sector and with other crops being developed. What is the goal for
coffee? The goal is 2 million (quintals--ed.) for 1970. That goal was
established more than a year ago, three times the amount then existing. It
seemed impossible, but 2 million quintals of coffee in 1970 is a goal which
will be very small, very small in comparison to the actual production of
coffee that will be reached by that date, according to all the work being
done.
That fact is that the organization, the experience, the equipment,
knowledge of the geography of the country--(Castro changes thought--ed.) It
can be said, sincerely, that the revolutionaries did not even know the
geography of the country when the revolution triumphed. Guane? Well we saw
a Guane on the map, near the (?little tail), the Cayman, which indicates
the shape of this island, or in Maisi, and so forth. However, we were not
geographers, nor did we spend any time studying geography or soils. In
every aspect, we really were ignorant of everything.
In the future we will not have to question or wonder about what was done
incorrectly. Instead, we will have to wonder how, when all the
revolutionaries were ignorant, they did not ruin the country. That is the
truth. Fortunately,it seems that revolutionaries are accompanied by some
instinct better than experience: intuition and, above all, good faith and
good intentions. Although it has been said that the road to hell is paved
with good intentions, I cannot otherwise explain how, if not through good
intentions, the revolutionaries come out ahead. (applause) The worst thing
is not that the revolutionaries are ignorant, but that in every revolution,
at the beginning everyone is ignorant. But very few realize it. The worse
thing is that they are ignorant while ignoring their ignorance--ignorant
people who ignore their ignorance. As a consequence, a series of alleged
sages emerge everywhere and begin to act like real sages everywhere, and
they begin to make all kinds of blunders, believing themselves to be wise
men. Later, a few realize they were not so wise.
However, one asks oneself: Can a revolution save itself from this?
Unfortunately, no. unfortunately, no, because (?in a real revolution the
exploited) replace the exploiters, those who had the monopoly of the little
knowledge that existed here; the few fat cats who knew something here, were
from the class affected by the revolution. Why the devil were they going to
cooperate? Suddenly a worker without any knowledge began to administer an
enormous farm. Sometimes it was not a worker, but a petit bourgeois. That
was even worse because the worker at least entered the job with the
mentality of a worker. He did not know anything and ruined the farm.
However, the petit bourgeois did not know anything either, and he ruined
it. But the worst thing was that one was left with a doubt as to whether he
did it in good or bad faith. So, it is very difficult. Today, naturally,
the revolution, the cadres of the revolution, have much greater knowledge
than the most distinguished of the bourgeois technicians in our country,
(Castro corrects himself--ed.) that is, not technicians, the owners and the
latifundists. During these eight years, we had the opportunity to develop
many cadres, to train many cadres. As I was saying, can a revolution avoid
this? No. I will tell you why not.
I remember an anecdote about the first days of the revolution. I will not
mention names. The person to whom I refer may have left the country, so do
not think this is a smear, not at all. The thing is that the so-called
development areas were established, and we put a university academician
there. He was from the agronomy school, which is like saying: this man
knows, sir; he is a real sage. Very well. During a recent trip to this
area, I got on this infernal Guanahacabibes road, searching for five
caballerias of citrus fruit. It was said that genius planted about 20
kilometers inside Guanahacabibes. There, where there was an organic layer
of this size (Castro presumably indicates the size--ed.), that sage, that
university professor, planted five caballerias of citrus fruit! What a
future (?for) five caballerias of citrus fruit; and he cleared the brush
there!
One asks how it is possible for that academician from the university
agronomy school to be sent to this development area, not realizing that
there are 3,000 caballerias which are perfect for citrus fruit, and enter
the Guanahacabibes Peninsula's hound's tooth to plant five caballerias of
citrus fruit? The worst thing--my suspicion, because I knew that good
man--is that I am certain he did not do it out of bad faith. He did it out
of ignorance, and he was an academician in the agronomy school of the very
illustrious Havana University of that time.
So, if a (word indistinct) agriculturally inexperienced petit bourgeois had
been placed there, he would have ruined the farm. If a worker without any
knowledge or administrative experience had been placed there, he would have
ruined the farm. But a personality, an academician, was placed there, and
he ruined it, too. Do you think that a revolution can avoid some of these
misfortunes? There is something--not science or knowledge--which must be
developed. It is experience in this difficult art of developing a country
and of building its economy, or organizing a new structure for society and
for production on the foundation of what had existed for hundreds of years.
Think of it: people were accustomed to what had always happened for
hundreds of years, and suddenly everything is changed. Suddenly, those who
have no experience in anything begin to make a new world. They are
historically correct. They are inspired by the best intentions. They
triumph in the long run, but during the first stage they are very poorly
armed with knowledge for that task. The good thing is that they achieve it
in the end by preserving and struggling, slowly accumulating experience in
order to march at a pace that is constantly firmer, faster, and more
promising.
I spoke about the academician. The academician planted his five
caballerias. No one else remembered those five caballerias, and it is
possible he himself does not remember any longer. The one who followed him
forgot the five caballerias; they were too far away. So what? Another sage
came. This one was not an academician; he was a cadre of the revolution, a
good boy.
He arrived, and I swear on my honor that I do not even remember his name.
He may be one of those who is distinguished on some other front today.
However, someone arrived at Guanahacabibes and that unfortunate person had
bad luck. The latifundists had taken away the fine lumber and planted
nothing. The wise academician had cleared out an area to plant five
caballerias of citrus fruit on that hound's tooth. When the revolutionary
arrived, he said: Here, here I will clear out the brush and plant pasture.
In the area known as (?La Arreta), he cleared 300 caballerias of brush on
the hound's tooth, and he planted guinea grass. The poor little cows we
have seen in that hound's tooth have a little food (few words indistinct),
but the poor little cows have no place to sleep because all they have are
hound's teeth on which no one can lie down and no one can walk. We are not
thinking about what to do with the (La Arreta) area, and areas where there
is not enough soil for a lumber-producing tree, we will put our little
coffee plantation. (laughter) So, we are thinking about reestablishing the
area. Why in the world clear the Guanahacabibes hound's tooth when there
are thousands of caballerias, once covered with marabu, here in the
lowlands, where magnificent pastures can be had? And the comrade of the
revolution to whom I have referred,the originator of (La Arreta), let him
forgive me if I have insulted him, just as we forgave him for what he did
in that period of ignorance.
I have cited some of the things that were done in the past. In the past,
under capitalism, it was a crime against nature more than ignorance. Later,
it was ignorance without crime. Finally, and you are exceptional witnesses
of this, we are reaching the stage in which things are being done
rationally, or, at least, that is what we believe at this time. Perhaps
incoming years we will uncover some blunders of this time, but we have the
great hope that the blunders we may commit now will be less significant
than those of the past. Sincerely, we are completely certain that the
things we are doing at this time are being well done, and are rational and
take into account all the factors every time a decision is reached about
the use of the land in order to give it the best use and get the maximum
benefit from our efforts and our natural resources.
You will take with you an impression of all this. What you have expressed
here, that mixture of joy and sadness you expressed when the day of
departure was mentioned, I think it was correct. I believe that all of you
may have experienced something of that feeling. We have visited here
several times. We have seen your attitude toward work. On some occasions,
some of these trucks, which you said passed (?under) the trees--of course,
I have not seen them pass under a tree--but I have seen them on some
occasions, at twilight, bringing back groups of cadres, after 12 hours of
work, filled with enthusiasm, singing,and with the same energy as if they
had just gotten out of bed. And we know that afterward, at night, they did
some other tasks. In the day they did some tasks in the fields, sometimes
harvesting tobacco leaves, and at night they tied the tobacco. They were in
the fields during the day, at the seedbeds at night, carrying bags or doing
other things.
We know that at times you averaged up to 17 and even 18 hours of work a
day. So, when we arrived here tonight and saw you at this farewell
ceremony, you, in our estimate, seemed much more valuable. We really began
to see you with different eyes, as we are forced to see those who have
spent 90 consecutive days working. During that time your enthusiasm
increased rather than decreased. In that period of time your productivity
for an eight-hour day was more than 50 percent higher than that of a
regular workers. We know that you worked not only our normal hours. You
worked far above the normal pace. This has been your reaction. This has
been the example you have given. We know, moreover, something else that is
very encouraging. That is, what has been happening here has also been
happening in other places, among the (?women) comrades that have been
working in agriculture, those who have been working in other tasks, those
who went to the Isle of Pines, those who went to Manao, and those who
joined in other tasks. A similar posture is shown by the comrade state
workers who have been cutting sugarcane. (applause) All this is very
encouraging to us.
This shows all the people the true path of the revolution: when one has
already acquired a social awareness, when every egotistical vestige of
property ownership has been disappearing, when man sees a real value in the
fruit of his labor, and when man realizes that everything he does benefits
himself as well as the rest and that what the others do also benefits him.
You have been able to see that you have been creating wealth, great wealth,
and that you will create the conditions that will--along with awareness and
education--help man lose his egoism. As long as there is an orange and 10
persons are enjoying it, there will always be 1,2,3,4, or 5 of them, or all
10 of them, eager to take possession of it.
However, 10 men possessing a communist awareness would divide the orange
into 10 equal parts and share it, or they would give the orange to the most
needy among them. However, it would be much more wonderful if these 10
communists, rather than having a single orange to turn over the most needy
of them or to divide into 10 equal parts, were to have 10, 20, 50, 100, or
1,000 oranges. If this were the case, the material basis that contributes
toward engendering egotism in man would disappear.
Communism can be established in a human society only when that egotism
disappears. Many times there is an abundance of things but the egotism
remains. There can be abundance without communism. Communism, however,
means abundance without egotism. However, communism cannot be achieved with
abundance alone. There is need of education and a real socialist awareness,
a real communist awareness. Egotism is so absurd and blind that it often
wants to take what is really needed and also what is not needed. Under
capitalism man as seized much more than he needs simply because he wants to
exploit the rest. The man of tomorrow in our society will live much
different from the way he did during that era when he lived amidst egotism,
when a few men seized almost everything to exploit the immense majority.
Here we are doing two things. The importance of your work here lies in the
two things you have been doing: You have been forging your revolutionary
awareness and you have been forging your socialist and communist awareness.
While you have been educating yourself for communism and while you have
been working as communists, you have helped create the material basis that
together with education and awareness, will permit us to live under true
communist standards. That is, true fraternal standards and true humane
standards, where each man and woman will look upon someone as his or her
brother, upon the rest as his or her brothers, and where no one will look
upon any of us as an enemy and rival. This is precisely the strength that
socialism and communism gives to man, that is, the strength of brothers, in
contrast to the weakness of those who are divided and who hate one another.
Here we have seen that strength in a practical manner. We have seen what a
group of human beings can do. We have seen what a small group of youths has
been able to do, working with enthusiasms. They did not consider work a
punishment. They considered it an ennobling experience. They considered it
an activity that inspires man and that can fill him with happiness. This is
what work is when it is not slave work. This is what work is when man is
not exploited. An exploited man looks upon work as suffering, and that is
exactly what it is. However, work will never be suffering but rather the
most ennobling, the most pleasant, and the most creative of man's activity.
Those of you who return here and do not go elsewhere will understand what I
am saying to you--those of you who will return here next year and see how
much these plants have grown, see how much wealthier this land has really
become, and see all the fruit of your labor. The work you have accomplished
here will be continued and will bear more and more fruit. The earth will
have the plants you have planted here: Our youth will have had their
experience; our revolution will have had encouragement from this reply of
the new revolutionary generation.
Fatherland or death; we will win! (applause)
-END-